"There's no way I can sleep like this!"
Hikari Uchiha sat up from the bed.
She'd already slept for a long stretch, and not long ago, Hanabi's healing had fully restored her body's functions to working order.
Like a phone charged to a hundred percent—no matter how long you leave it plugged in, it won't take any more.
And on top of that, she'd just overheard those words.
"That person—is she her sister?"
A hollow feeling settled deep in her chest.
Not long before, a single word—"friend"—had stirred something faintly sweet inside her.
But now.
She, an outsider, seemed to have fractured the bond between sisters.
—For the clan.
Back when she was still "Uchiha Nanashi," the clan had hammered that idea into her endlessly, reshaping her into nothing more than the clan's weapon.
But perhaps a real family—a true one—was supposed to be like Hanabi's. People who worried about each other, who cherished each other, who could even feel jealous for each other.
They were sisters.
And she was nothing but an intruder.
Sleep was out of the question.
"These clothes... they're Hanabi's too, aren't they."
She was wearing a pale pink yukata.
Simple, but the fabric was fine.
"If I just left right now, would that be better? But I haven't repaid her yet... No—she went ahead and saved me on her own. It's not like I asked her to."
But that feeling of being saved. That sense of safety. It really was... wonderful.
And yet the very person who'd been saved was now driving a wedge between two sisters.
Restless.
A restlessness more violent than the hatred that had once wanted to tear the shinobi world apart.
"Ugh—it's definitely the weather's fault!"
It was already June.
Hikari had picked up some basic information from Hanabi earlier. This country was the Land of Fire, and clans of shinobi had gathered into individual hidden villages. She'd also learned what time of year it was.
June.
The heat was nothing to a shinobi—enduring it was trivial.
But that stifling air pressing against the restlessness inside her was burning her alive.
"Maybe... just step out for some air."
She left her room and slipped out onto the veranda.
A cool breeze swept over her. At last, she could think straight.
"...Is everything alright?"
"Yes, don't worry. Neji."
"Hanabi, you seem a little distracted."
"Ah—no, no. Not at all."
That was Hanabi's voice? And a male voice—a brother?
In the moment between being carried out of the seal site by Hanabi and losing consciousness, she'd vaguely sensed what seemed like two other people nearby.
So this must be one of them.
"You said before that as long as the Jashin mark is on her, that means... if she were to die—"
"That's absolutely out of the question!"
When Hanabi heard Neji's voice, the tangled mess of thoughts finally started to clear.
At first, Hanabi had invited her older sister Hinata with a few goals in mind.
One: special training.
Two: Hinata was a gentle soul by nature—having her around might help build a warmer connection with Hikari.
But Hinata's reaction had torn Hanabi's script clean in half.
If Hinata had simply been unhappy and sulking, Hanabi could have worked with that. But Hinata had said she supported her little sister—and that left Hanabi completely at a loss.
After that, Neji had pulled Hanabi aside.
Hanabi had written the script, but Neji was her brother too, and he had his own thoughts.
Hanabi bore the Jashin mark. And from what Hanabi had told him, that Uchiha woman was most likely the one possessed by Jashin's power.
—Back at the seal site, Neji had sensed that presence firsthand.
Neji cared more about his little sister surviving than about Hikari Uchiha.
Hanabi said she wanted to save that girl, but...
If they simply killed her... wouldn't that save Hanabi?
Director Hanabi found herself teetering on the edge of a catastrophic derailment.
But precisely because of it, she finally got her head on straight.
In a crisis, what you needed most was the kind of performance that could salvage everything.
Hikari hadn't slept—she was out on the veranda. Odds were she already knew what was going on here. She might have heard every word.
"Hikari is my friend," Hanabi spoke first. "As for Jashin—that power was forced onto her by someone else. Hikari is a victim too. No one is at fault here."
"Then what do you plan to do?" Neji asked.
"Simple—we just destroy Jashin's spirit fragment directly," Hanabi said.
"Jashin's spirit fragment...?"
"Right, it's over at the seal site. You saw that power too, didn't you? We just need to think it through carefully."
Hanabi had already set up an ice-crystal clone of Master Jingliu at the seal site and, using the power of resonance, had caused it to become Mara-Struck, transforming it into that monstrous form they'd seen earlier.
After that, she'd fed it a measure of chakra and placed a temporary seal on it.
Before long, the clone would break through the seal—and when it did, a wide area around it would likely crystallize entirely in ice.
By that point, however, the Jingliu Puppet would be all but spent.
And then—a joint battle: the siblings and Hikari, fighting together. Not only would that pull her sister Hinata back emotionally, it would forge a deeper bond between everyone.
Wonderful. Truly wonderful.
The perfect script: under the heroes' combined assault, the story would reach a brilliant, triumphant conclusion.
Neji was finally convinced.
And on the veranda, Hikari had already slipped away.
Good.
Things were back on track.
She'd nearly crashed, but her last-second maneuvering had pulled everything back together.
"My, my—playing with people's hearts really is no easy task, is it."
Hanabi didn't mind the occasional derailment. If a derailment drove bigger viewership, she'd crash a few times happily.
But near the person she liked—that was somewhere she truly didn't want to lose control.
"I got complacent."
Naruto, Sasuke, even Kakashi, Zabuza—guiding them all had its methods.
Those ones were essentially "bronze-tier": hotheads who just needed to charge forward with their heads down, and the rest she could leave to Director Hanabi.
This was a "master-tier" game. Both Neji and Hinata were far more complicated in how they thought.
It was a useful reminder.
—She'd need far more detailed plans and far more contingencies going forward.
But for now, it was time to pay a different kind of price.
"It must be because of me, after all..."
Hikari returned to her room.
She sat with her thoughts.
Something wicked seemed to be attached to her—something that endangered Hanabi.
"Mm...?"
A shinobi's vigilance caught the sound of movement from outside.
Faint. It seemed to be coming from Hanabi's room—